OpenMedia Launches Plan to Fix Mobile Phone and Internet in Canada

Canadian non-profit organization OpenMedia has launched new report based on consumer feedback that aims to fix and repair the mobile phone and internet market in Canada. Their crowdsourced study of website visitors revealed Canadians are often forced to deal with poor and disrespectful service from wireless carriers. The reason for this is due to the lack of choice in Canada, as the report notes Rogers, TELUS and Bell own 94% of the market.

The 59 page report titled “Time for an Upgrade: Demanding Choice in Canada’s Cell Phone Market” focuses on 12 specific problems, part of three themes of complaints Canadians have about the mobile market: price gouging, disrespectful customer service and respective contracts.

Data within the report was gathered from October 17, 2012 to February 15, 2013 from 2,859 Canadians as they submitted their “cell phone horror stories” on OpenMedia.ca. Respondents overall expressed frustration and felt Canada was behind other industrialized nations in terms of price and quality. One respondent even submitted a 14 page long story. Here are some examples of ‘horror stories’ submitted that you might be able to empathize with:

“In 2002 I had my legs crushed in a horrible accident. I could not work and was surviving on government funding temporarily. There was 8 months left to a three year plan on my TELUS cell phone. I phone the company, hoping to use the exceptional emergency clause, in order to be released from the remainder of the contract, I told the person I spoke with that medical and police records could be provided. They told me I did not qualify for the exceptional emergency clause. I asked how I would qualify and was told ‘you would have needed to die.’ – Batch 2, p.509

“My contract was expired with Rogers and after 3 years of terrible service I decided to switch to Bell. I followed the rules and made the switch properly, yet still received a $400 bill from Rogers that I had not completed my contract and needed to buy out the contract.” Batch 2, p.357

“[They] renewed my contract for an additional 3 years without my knowledge or consent. I called repeatedly, spending hours on the phone and eventually almost 1.5 years fighting with them that the contract was renewed not of my consent. Each call is said to be recorded so I had asked them to review the call. They refused without explanation and stated that contracts could not be reversed. One “customer service” person went as far to say that I was a liar and that their computer records don’t lie.” -Batch 3, p.441

“A few days after the funeral […] I had to start helping my mom take care of various business items, such as cancelling the cell phone that my head had. I will never forget my mom calling the cell phone company.

The operator at Bell was unbelievable. My mom explained that her husband had just died and that she need to cancel his cell phone, but she would be keeping her phone. The operator didn’t even have the courtesy to express her condolences and then proceeded to tell her that there would be a $200 + early cancellation fee.” -Batch 2, p.185

Canada is also known to have some of the highest roaming fees in the world out of OECD nations, as summarized in the chart below:

I’m sure there are a million such stories. I had a problem with their faulty billing (Rogers). I asked them to check the notes the previous customer service rep had made. And guess what? They wrote down something totally different from what they told me!
So I asked them to check their recordings. They said that would do that and a manager would get back to me.
Never heard from them again.
When I called back several days later they had no record that they were going to check the tapes.
If you threaten to leave and go to Bell they are a little more compliant.
But then we all know that Bell is no better. There just isn’t anywhere to go if you want a reasonable rate and non deceitful service.

http://www.iphoneincanada.ca Gary

There’s nothing worse than retelling a story to multiple CSRs

1His_Nibs1

We’ve seen this movie before but replace wireless industry with oil companies and how gas prices will be investigated/studied. An astute person can see the conflict of interest in that statement as higher gas prices equates to more tax revenue for the federal government thus any/every study always ending in the federal government not being able to prove conclusively that there is collusion or price fixing. Ottawa and the CRTC may be talking tough but in the end we’ll see if it’s all bark and no bite. (I’m betting the latter) One has to wonder how strong the wireless industry’s lobby is and whether they can convince the CRTC and Ottawa to tone down the rhetoric and water down any potential legislation.

SV650

Unless I am reading it wrong, if there are as many errors in the rest of the report as the Roaming Fees graph, I have little faith in the rest of the document. My carrier charges $5 (max)/ MB in the US, Europe & Oceania, and $10 in South America, Africa & Asia; far below the rates indicated in the graph. Also, a survey of 2859 self-selected respondents makes a VERY biased survey.